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1993 900S radiator cooling fan fuse (and hot-running) issue Posted by kc900 [Email]  (#2018) [Profile/Gallery]
(more from kc900) on Sun, 11 Sep 2016 12:01:20
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Greetings everyone, and please forgive my lengthy first post.
My 93 900s seems to have a mystery cooling fan fuse issue, and a general hot-running issue, that I've largely mitigated by not driving the car in very hot and humid weather (over 80 degrees), in stop and go traffic, and in both combined. As I live in Queens NY, enjoy driving my car, and can't really avoid hot weather and traffic, I don't think that this is the best solution to the problem. To prologue, last summer during a particularly hot and humid day I had a bad overheat situation where the car went into the red and burst the expansion tank while in bad traffic. My mechanic (who I understand to be only person working on Saab's in the NYC metro area these days, but that's a different thread) asserted that the culprit was that my secondary cooling fan blew up from the overuse. The loss of the secondary fan then took the car into an overheat state, culminating in a burst expansion tank and a dead c900 on the Queensboro Bridge on-ramp. So he replaced the dead secondary fan with a used c900T fan, and wired both fans to kick on simultaneously when the thermoswitch activates. Upon later inspection I noticed that he did not switch out the radiator cooling fan relay per the Townsend article (reference SAAB bulletin 03/92-0091), but perhaps that's a different thread. A few weeks later, again after a bout of bad stop and go traffic in very hot and humid weather, I noticed that the temp gauge has spiked. I pulled over and noted that the 30 amp radiator cooling fan fuse blew. I changed the fuse and brought it over to my mechanic, who wasn't able to replicate the situation and therefore couldn't figure out why the fuse blew. I chalked it up as an old fuse. I asked him to pressure test the cooling system and check the ground for the fans, and he noted that both seemed to check out okay. Fast forward to this weekend (again, hot and humid), I took the car out to the local service station to change the battery. On the way back home, again in bad stop and go traffic with the cooling fans running almost continuously, I noticed that the temp gauge had spiked. I shut the car down and noted that the radiator cooling fan fuse blew again. Changing out the fuse I noted that the cooling fans came back up, and noted that this appears to be the new normal. For background FYI, both fans usually kick on when the temp gauge pushes above the middle mark. For more background FYI, I never use the AC so as to not overload the engine during this weather.
Like an earlier member posted, am I resigned to having a hot-running, 3-season car that I can only drive on roadways with shoulders where I can pull over to swap out the fuse?
Sorry for the long post, but does anyone have any suggestions as to what the issue may be? I do happen have every service record ever done on the car, so I know that the head gasket was done over in 2003, and that he cooling system hoses were completely replaced in 2006. There's no indication of a replaced radiator, but it appears to be in okay shape from my visual inspection. There's no indication of a head gasket issue from what my mechanic can see.
Suggestions for an alternate mechanic in the NY metro area would be welcome as well. While he does good work a second opinion is always helpful.
, Sun, 11 Sep 2016 12:01:20 <-- Viewing This Message
, Sun, 11 Sep 2016 12:10:40
, Tue, 13 Sep 2016 05:48:45, Wed, 21 Sep 2016 16:49:22, Thu, 22 Sep 2016 16:34:55
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